Changes bringing new excitement to Seminarian Education Dinner

Fathers Gervan Menezes, left, Daniel Steiner, and Michael Fye solicit bids for a Brazilian dinner prepared by them during the last year’s Seminarian Education Dinner and Auction. They will be offering this again at the event to be held at Our Lady of the Lake, May 22 from 6-9 p.m. Tennessee Register file photo by Andy Telli

In its the ninth year, organizers of the Seminarian Education Dinner and Auction hope to continue the upward trajectory of the success of the event even as it undergoes several changes this year.

The Seminarian Education Dinner, which will be held 6-9 p.m. Tuesday, May 22, will move this year to a new location: Our Lady of the Lake Church in Hendersonville.

And members of the Serra Clubs of Williamson County and Nashville, which have taken the lead for organizing the event in the past, have handed over those duties to members of Knights of Columbus Council 9132 at Our Lady of the Lake and other members of the parish.

The local Serra Clubs are preparing for Serra’s International Convention to be held in Nashville June 28-July 1 and were unavailable to organize both events at the same time.

Past organizers, such as Bob Rudman, Lloyd Crocket, Gerard Killmeyer and other Serra members, have been helping Doug Blake, the chairman of the organizing committee for this year’s dinner and auction, for the past year.

“The smooth transition and all the help from the people from Williamson County, it made it a much easier event to do,” said Blake, a member of Council 9132 and a parishioner at Our Lady of the Lake.

“They’ve been showing us all the things they’ve developed in the past to take it from $6,000 (in the first year) to over $300,000 last year,” Blake said. “We’re hoping to make this one the biggest ever.”

The goal for this year’s dinner and auction is $325,000, Blake said.

“Though it seems ambitious, we feel excited and confident we’re going to meet that,” Blake said. “Our confidence for that is based on the excitement around our new bishop, but most of it is the past generosity from the people of the diocese.”

The event began during the tenure of the late Bishop David Choby. The first year, the dinner and auction was held at the Cathedral of the Incarnation in Nashville. But as the event grew, it was moved to Holy Family Church in Brentwood and became one of the largest fund raising events in the Diocese of Nashville.

The diocese currently has 23 seminarians, and the cost of educating them is more than $1 million a year. The Seminarian Education Dinner and Auction raises money to help shoulder that cost so that the Catholic community of Middle Tennessee will continue to have priests to serve their spiritual needs in the future.

There have been many changes in the diocese in the last year, chief among them the ordination of installation of Bishop J. Mark Spalding as the new Bishop of Nashville. “People will have a chance to see him in his first real major public event since his ordination,” Blake said.

With Bishop Spalding’s arrival in the diocese has come much excitement, Blake noted.

“The air of excitement that’s in Nashville right now … it’s just a great time to be Catholic in Middle Tennessee,” Blake said. “That excitement is going to carry over to the event we’re doing.”

The excitement is growing at Our Lady of the Lake, the new venue for the dinner and auction.

“It’s the biggest event we’ve ever held in our new St. Joseph Hall,” Blake said of Our Lady of the Lake’s parish hall, which was dedicated in August 2016 and can accommodate 650 people.

Blake is hopeful moving the event from Williamson County to Sumner County will make the dinner and auction more accessible to people in the northern part of the diocese without putting too much of a burden on the people in the southern portion.

As in the past, the event will be sponsored by the Serra Clubs of Williamson County and Nashville and the Tennessee Knights of Columbus. “Both our organizations support vocations to the priesthood and religious life,” Blake noted.

Knights of Columbus Council 9132 at Our Lady of the Lake, with about 400 members, is the largest council in the state and among its most active. “We already have a lot of resources we can draw from,” Blake said.

The organizing committee is broader than Council 9132 members, including Our Lady of the Lake parishioners, and is receiving help from diocesan offices and Serra Club members, Blake said.

“But this event is not about us, it’s not about the Knights,” Blake said. “It’s about the seminarians and trying to carry on the tradition started by Bishop Choby with the vocations program.”

Most of the diocese’s seminarians and many of its priests will attend the dinner and auction so that the people of the diocese can meet their future priests.

The theme of this year’s Seminarian Education Dinner and Auction is “Feel the Love of Jesus in Your Heart,” which was taken from Bishop Spalding’s remarks at the end of his ordination and installation Mass.

“Pray, pray to God that the love of Jesus ever increases in your heart,” Bishop Spalding said then. “If you do that, not only, I believe, you save yourself, but you help save others and that is what the Church is all about.”

Organizers will receive a boost toward reaching their goal of $325,000 from a matching grant by Catholic Extension, which supports mission dioceses, including the Diocese of Nashville.

“The generous support of Catholic Extension is providing an opportunity of a challenge grant of $50,000 this year,” said Sandra Jordan, director of grants and annual giving for the diocese. “The challenge is they will match up to $50,000 in new money raised.”

People who want to donate specifically toward the matching grant can contact Jordan at Sandra.jordan@dioceseofnashville.com.

Silent and live auction

The highlight of the event will again be the silent and live auctions.

Returning are some of the most popular auction items from past years, including dinner with Bishop Spalding, prepared by Clean Plate Club Master Chef Chris Holmes and his staff; a Brazilian dinner for eight in the Cathedral rectory hosted and prepared by Fathers Gervan Menezes, Dan Steiner and Michael Fye; and High Tea with the Dominican Sisters of St. Cecilia.

A new item will be a golf cart purchased for Bishop Choby, but used by him only a few times, Blake said.

The golf cart not only has sentimental value to Bishop Choby’s many friends, but it could be used by a parish to help people move about on their grounds, Blake said. “It would be a wonderful item for a group of people to get together to bid on for their parish to help people with mobility challenges.”

Last year’s dinner and auction was held in the midst of the Nashville Predators’ historic run to the Stanley Cup finals, and one of the most popular items was a hockey stick signed by the team.

Blake is hoping another long playoff run by the Predators this year will generate the same sort of excitement.

Bob Kohl, an Our Lady of the Lake parishioner and a member of Council 9132, is the Senior Director of Broadcast and Entertainment for the Predators. “He’s landed us some amazing Predators stuff,” Blake said.

Among the live auction items is a “Third Man in the Booth” package, which will provide one lucky bidder the chance to enjoy dinner with Preds radio play-by-play announcer Pete Weber and color analyst Hal Gill for dinner before the game and then join them in the booth during a home game at Bridgestone Arena next season.

A second Predators package will include two tickets to a home game next season, a one-night stay at the Omni Hotel, breakfast for two at the hotel’s restaurant, Kitchen Notes, and a Preds jersey signed by the team.

Tickets to the Seminarian Education Dinner and Auction are $100 each. People can also purchase at table for 10 people for $1,000 and a table for 12 for $1,200. People can reserve their seats online at www.dioceseofnashville.com. Registration forms also will be included in brochures that will be distributed to parishes throughout the diocese. People can mail those forms to Diocese of Nashville, Seminarian Education Fund, Catholic Pastoral Center, 2800 McGavock Pike, Nashville, Tennessee, 37214.

People who are unable to attend the dinner and auction can make donation online or by mailing in the registration form in the brochure.

For more information about the dinner and auction, or to bid online, visit https://futurepriestbenefit.weebly.com.

“I want everybody to come and have fun and spend time with the priests and seminarians,” Blake said. “It’s going to be a fun night.”

For more information about auction items, visit https://futurepriestbenefit.weebly.com.